If the National Rifle Association’s sponsorship of this week’s NASCAR Sprint Cup race sparks a bit of controversy, at least the race will be run in an area where the NRA enjoys great support.

The NRA 500 is set for Saturday at Texas Motor Speedway. It marks the first time that the organization, which is at the heart of the polarizing gun-control debate, has sponsored a Cup event.

The NRA sponsored a Nationwide Series race last year at Atlanta Motor Speedway, but that event didn’t have the notoriety of a Cup event and the NRA wasn’t in the spotlight as much prior to the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in December.

Race sponsorships for the sport’s biggest tracks typically cost more than $1 million, and TMS President Eddie Gossage said that the NRA “paid full boat” for the deal. Whether the sponsorship continues could be determined by the public outcry this week.

But Gossage doesn’t expect that to be a problem — not in Texas.

“This isn’t a sponsorship that would work if you were at Sears Point Raceway (near San Francisco),” Gossage said. “We’re Texas Motor Speedway and I know what works here and what doesn’t. This isn’t an issue here.”

There won’t be NRA members passing out leaflets at the track and there will be no pro-NRA speeches during the weekend. Gossage said Monday he was unsure whether NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre will attend. When the sponsorship was announced, LaPierre said, "NRA members and NASCAR fans love their country and everything that is good and right about our country.”

Former NBA player Karl Malone will give the command to start engines and Texas Gov. Rick Perry will wave the green flag.

Gossage said that it’s mostly the media that has made noise about the NRA sponsorship.

“It’s just not a big deal to the public. … The public isn’t having a problem (with this),” Gossage said.

But politicians have reacted and gotten involved. U.S. Senator Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) wrote a letter to NASCAR asking for it to step in and not allow the race to be sponsored by the NRA. Race entitlement sponsors make sponsorship deals with tracks, but NASCAR has the right through its sanction agreement to nix a sponsorship.

The NRA and Murphy are on opposite sides of proposed gun control legislation being debated following the Dec. 14 shooting of 20 children and six staff members at the Connecticut elementary school.

“By giving the NRA sponsorship of a major NASCAR race, NASCAR has crossed a line—you have decided to put yourself in the middle of a political debate, and you have taken a side that stands in opposition to the wishes of so many Newtown families who support common sense gun reform,” Murphy wrote in a letter to NASCAR.

“Whether or not this was your intention, your fans will infer from this sponsorship that NASCAR and the NRA are allies in the current legislative debate over gun violence.”

NASCAR released a statement when the sponsorship was announced saying that the sponsorship “falls within the guidelines for approval for that event.”

Murphy said in an interview Wednesday that he talked with NASCAR Chairman Brian France by phone and got the impression that France had “some level of discomfort about the arrangement,” but he has gotten no official response from NASCAR.

“I’m concerned that it gives the NRA legitimacy at a moment when they deserve none,” Murphy said. “The NRA, in my mind, has become an extreme political organization, very distant from the organization’s roots.

“The NRA is clawing for legitimacy and they found a way to get it by aligning themselves with NASCAR.”

U.S. Rep. Michael Burgess, R-Texas, said that Murphy shouldn’t be butting into a private Texas business deal.

“This is a sports marketing decision,” Burgess told The Dallas Morning News. “A member of Congress, a U.S. senator, should not be telling NASCAR folks how to run their business.”

Murphy said he was not advocating that the sponsorship be outlawed, but he has a right to express his opinion and NASCAR has a right to decide to keep the sponsorship.

“I don’t think there are going to be legions of fans signing up as NRA members,” Murphy said. “This will be a good weekend for the NRA with respect to their public image because of their association with the great sporting tradition with NASCAR.

“We’re in a legislative fight. The NRA is on one side, and they very smartly wrapped themselves in NASCAR at a pretty critical moment.”

NASCAR helped support a car that encouraged people to text donations to the Sandy Hook School Support Fund.

Michael Waltrip drove the car in the Daytona 500, with NASCAR Chairman Brian France pledging $50,000 and the NASCAR Foundation matching that pledge.

Patrick Kinney, spokesman for the fund, said that the car was uplifting for the community and did more than just raise money.

He attributed approximately $25,000 of the public donations through the texting program to the Daytona 500 car. NASCAR team pledges, combined with the France and foundation pledges, brought the total between $150,000 and $200,000, he said.

“NASCAR made some major contributions to Newtown in the wake of the tragedy and they essentially canceled those good deeds out by weighing in on this legislative fight against so many families in Newtown,” Murphy said.

Swan Racing owner Brandon Davis, who owns the car Waltrip drove, said he does not see the NRA sponsorship as hypocritical to that fund-raising and community healing effort.

“We did this to raise awareness and help the families. … I don’t feel there should be any connection with (that and) the NRA sponsorship,” Davis said.

“That (gun control debate) was not the purpose of it.”

NASCAR driver Austin Dillon, whose grandfather and team owner Richard Childress is on the NRA Board of Directors, had the NRA on his Nationwide car for the race at Atlanta.

“It just goes along with our fan base — having the NRA involved in NASCAR is good for our sport,” Dillon said.

“I’ve been hunting and fishing and (involved in) the outdoors since I was 7 years old and learned how to shoot a gun and when you know how to shoot a gun, safety is everything. … The NRA and the whole group is trying to protect that right to own a gun and also (teach) how to use it.”

In light of the NRA sponsorship, Clint Bowyer will carry a gun safety message as part of a sponsorship from Gander Mountain.

“I think it’s important for (Gander Mountain) to deliver our message,” said Steve Uline, executive vice president of marketing for Gander Mountain. “The NRA messaging is their messaging, but ours is 100 percent around personal responsibility and keeping firearms out of the hands of the underage, untrained and unauthorized people.

“We have our own message and that is what we are going to stay on point with.”

If Bowyer wins at Texas Saturday, he will participate in the traditional celebration of firing six-shooters filled with blanks in victory lane.

“(That) is the history and tradition behind the race — it has been since I think the very first race (there),” Bowyer said. “The main thing is the responsibility of what you do with it afterward.”

Gossage considered getting rid of the traditional celebration but opted to keep it. He believes it’s something drivers look forward to when they visit victory lane.

“We’ve done it for many years and everybody knows it,” Gossage said. “It’s not a political statement any more than the minutemen at the back of the end zone at New England Patriots games that fire their muskets when the Patriots score.

“Are the Patriots making a political statement? No, of course not. … Cowboys. Six-shooters. Makes sense.”